Berthing Place
by Karshtakavaar
Summary: Stuart Reed-centric prequel. Malcolm's very young in this one.: As Stuart Reed will tell you, the road to hell is paved with good intentions and a journey begins with a single step.


**A/N** I'm using the word 'tea' here to mean an evening meal, dinner basically. Thank you to everyone who's reviewed my previous stories. It's very much appreciated. Your choice of custard creams or bourbon biscuits to anyone who reviews this time round. I may even have some jammie dodgers here somewhere... : ). Usual disclaimer. I don't own the characters and I don't make money off them. I also don't own the radio programme, the BBC does.

**Berthing Place**

Lieutenant Stuart Reed paused, key in hand, finding himself almost a stranger on his own front doorstep. A disjointed feeling. The view was at once so familiar it was like breathing yet somehow shocking in its familiarity.

_This was my life. What I missed those long months at sea. And yet somehow it isn't. Little things are - not out of place exactly - but different. Next door's garden has grown, matured. Someone fixed the broken panel in our garden gate. And we never had flower tubs in the porch before._

With a start of surprise he realised that Mary must have planted them. He imagined her buying the pots. Standing by a rack of seed packets picking out blue delphiniums and red geraniums, their young son asleep in the pram beside her. He felt a stab of guilt.

_I should have been there. Picking out plants with my wife. Mending the garden gate. Changing my son's nappies. Not languishing in some port halfway across the globe on endless training exercises while Mary coped with the night feeds._

He should never have gone, he realised. Should never have left when Malcolm was so little. But they'd called, the top brass. And as much as he'd wanted to say no, to tell them to take a long walk off a short pier he somehow found he couldn't. Maybe it was those generations of ancestors, rising like some ancient tidal wave, pressing down on him. A Reed does not abandon his country in her hour of need. He does his duty.

_Or just maybe,_ some snide voice buried deep down whispered, _maybe the sight of that squalling, squirming, pink bundle of flesh, that your sisters-in-law cooed over so excitedly, scared you so much you ran away. Ran back to something you knew. That you could control. Somewhere you felt safe._

He stuffed the thought down, locking it in a box in an inner room of his mind. He was tired, that was all, he told himself. And who wouldn't be? It had been a long tour and he had come directly from two straight shifts. He was tired and over emotional. What he needed now was to kiss Mary, grab some food and then fall in to bed.

He pushed the key firmly into the lock and twisted, hearing the bolt slide back. The front door still stuck a little, he noted, requiring more force than should really be necessary to open it. This time he must fix that. Find his plane and remove the portion of wood that had swollen and warped in the rain. Maybe he couldn't mend the gate but he could mend the door.

Inside the hallway was warm, filled with the smell of baking cakes. The sound of a comedy programme playing on the radio filtered through the open doorway to the kitchen.

_"Repetition. Two avocados."_

_"Well listened. There were two avocados, so we say you have a correct challenge. You have the subject, 'Vulcan mythology', and seventeen seconds. Your time starts...now."_

A small boy with a mass of unruly black hair and grey eyes stared openly at him from a high chair. A bowl of beige goop and a blue plastic baby spoon lay forgotten on the tray in front of him.

His wife appeared in the doorway.

"Stuart. You're home."

He dropped the kit bag by the front door and was down the hallway in three strides. He pulled Mary into an embrace, scarcely able to believe that this was real, that she was here and he was home. He could feel her smile as she wrapped her arms around him. The familiar old feeling of comfort as their bodies relaxed against one another. For one blissful moment it was as if he'd never left.

Then Malcolm squawked in indignation at being ignored. Mary pulled back, a sheepish smile on her lips.

"I think His Highness wants the second half of his tea."

* * *

Stuart watched as his young son missed his mouth with the spoon, smearing strawberry yoghurt across half a cheek before eventually finding his target.

_At what age, exactly, did they start to eat with some decorum? Surely it should be by now, shouldn't it?_

"The doctor found out what the rashes were, by the way."

Stuart forced his attention back to his wife. She waved a computer PADD under his nose. Stuart recognised the NHS logo, took it and scanned down skim reading the letter.

"Allergies," Mary explained. "Dust mites, oak pollen, pineapple..."

She watched his face as he scrolled through the list. The very long list.

"Good job I didn't let him near his cousin's birthday cake. The doctor said the anaphylatic shock could have killed him." The expression on her face belied her light words. His wife was worried.

Across the room, Malcolm had dropped the yoghurt coated spoon on the floor. Two chubby arms were raised high, fingers on each hand splayed, and were brought down with a crash on the tray in front of him. The bowl of strawberry yoghurt jumped, small flecks of gloop flying out and spattering the bib and the front of his jersey. The boy grinned ecstatically and raised his arms to repeat the action.

"Malcolm, don't do that," Mary scolded gently. Turning back to her husband she said, "The doctor's given me a hypospray with some emergency medication. And we're to call for an ambulance straight away if we think he's having a reaction. The health visitor's coming to check on him next Thursday and advise on cleaning routines for the house."

Stuart let the rest of her sentences wash over him. His eyes drifted to his son. His son. The one he wanted to continue the family line. To finally make admiral, a Reed at the top of the fleet. His son, who was apparently more vulnerable than a girl. One grain of the wrong sort of pollen and he'd keel over - destroyed by his own immune system.

He watched as Malcolm splashed his hands in the remains of the yoghurt before smearing it across his forehead and into his fringe. The boy giggled in delight.

"Malcolm!" Mary Reed crossed the kitchen floor, scooping the yoghurt coated bowl from the tray and deftly catching both wrists before they could do any more damage. "How can you give your Daddy a cuddle like that? You'll get yoghurt all over his uniform. And then where will we be? Mmm?" She gently chided him as she cleaned his face and fingers, holding on to his wrists until she had the tray of the high chair clean too.

Stuart watched as she dropped the dirty piece of kitchen towel into the bin before rinsing the yoghurt bowl in the sink. This could have played out just the same if he wasn't there, he realised. They'd learned to cope without him, Mary and Malcolm. It was almost as if he were intruding on their little world.

His wife dried her hands on her apron, crossed to the high chair and picked up their son.

"Give Daddy a big hug to say welcome home!"

She pushed Malcolm into his startled arms. Stuart was surprised by how heavy he'd become. The last time he'd held him the boy was no longer than his forearm and not much heavier than a couple of bags of sugar. The milky strawberry scented mass that he now held in his arms looked more like a child than a baby and weighed like one too.

"Hello, Malcolm. It's Daddy." It felt ridiculous to say and obviously sounded so too for the little boy immediately began to howl. Twisting and kicking Malcolm fought to escape the embrace of the stranger, arms outstretched to Mummy and safety. _He doesn't know me_, thought Stuart. _My son doesn't know me and he's afraid of me_. He felt his gut lurch. How could this be? His son was a weakling and a coward. His heart rebelled against the thought but his mind seemed to be working its way to some inexorable conclusion. The child had been spoiled. He should never have left him alone with Mary, even at so young an age. She had over mothered him, made him weak.

Mary took the distressed child from his arms, soothing him with gentle words, stroking his back and swinging her body side to side. The boy laid his head against her chest, quiet now, fingers of one hand abandoned mid-suck and watched his father suspiciously from half closed eyes.

"He's tired," his wife apologised. "He's been up since six."

Stuart nodded dumbly.

"Come on, sleepy head. Let's get that yoghurt out of your hair and you in to bed."

He watched as she climbed the stairs to the bathroom their son held tightly in her arms. His duty was plain. The Singapore commission was completely out. The priority now had to be his son and their future. It was clear to Stuart Reed that if the boy was to stand any chance in the Navy at all the law would have to be laid down clearly from now on. He could only hope it wasn't too late.

**A/N 2** You have no idea quite how hard I had to fight with myself not to put "In which Malcolm gets covered in strawberry yoghurt" in the tagline for this. Would have given you all totally the wrong impression, though!


End file.
